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Artist's impression of the planned College Green plaza in the heart of Dublin, looking towards Trinity College Picture Dublin City Council/PA

The planned College Green plaza in the heart of Dublin is designed to host public events for up to 15,000 people.

The pedestrianised zone running from Dame Street past the Bank of Ireland and across the front of Trinity College will be paved with granite, lined with trees and include a defined cycle path and a separate route for buses, taxis and Luas trams.

Dublin City Council released new impressions of the final design and said the development was a unique opportunity to reclaim an important urban space.

Lead architect Paul Keogh said: "With Dublin City Council, we are aiming to create 'Dublin's living room' - a place that is safe, adaptable and friendly for people of all ages, both for everyday social interaction and for major public events, comparable with world-class spaces of similar scale internationally."

If planners give it the go-ahead in the coming months, work lifting the roads and removing existing trees is scheduled to begin next January, with the entire project taking about a year to complete.

The council said the plaza, or "civic space" as it described it, will reclaim College Green's historic footprint running from the front gates of Trinity College to Anglesea Street and also take in Foster Place.

The two-way Luas lines at the front of the university will provide a strip for the limited amount of public transport traffic to pass through on a north-south route.

Taxi ranks will be shifted on to neighbouring streets and a new turning circle for buses is being built at the Dame Street end of College Green.

Twenty-two new trees will be planted, the council said, and the existing Henry Grattan and Thomas Davis monuments will be restored as key focal points with the Davis statue reset on a spot slightly further west of where it now sits.

Fountains are also being set into the ground, with one section of the plaza holding 32 individual seasonally controlled water jets, which will be switched off for public events.

The project is being designed by Dixon Jones/Paul Keogh Architects.

Architect Ali Grehan said: "The clear preference was for a pedestrian and cycle-friendly open space. This College Green project is a unique opportunity for Dublin to reclaim an urban space of prime civic importance and of national and international significance."